Hard Freeze Tonight … “Mid-January” Highs Saturday

View of the National Capital from the Netherlands Carillon in Arlington, Virginia (photo courtesy National Park Service).

Most locations away from the immediate shore of the Potomac River and Chesapeake Bay will drop into the lower to middle 20s tonight… cover your sensitive plants. Highs on Saturday will struggle under sunny skies to reach 40 degrees.

How cold will it be in your back yard? Check out the latest high-resolution models:

High temperatures on Saturday afternoon will keep it feeling like mid-January with temperatures struggling to reach 40 degrees across many of our northern and western suburbs:

With dew points in the teens tomorrow night along with clear skies and calm winds we are setting up for an ideal radiation cooling event (where heat at the earth’s surface is able to rapidly escape or re-radiate back into the atmosphere).

Temperatures on Sunday morning could very well drop into the lower to mid 20s in the urban heat island of Downtown Washington with widespread teens in our suburbs. A moderating trend is in store for the upcoming work week with some more much-needed rain Monday night into the day on Tuesday.